CSN Houston case returns to courthouse Monday, but that’s the only certainty

It’s been a quiet couple of weeks on the Comcast SportsNet Houston legal front. U.S. District Judge Lynn Hughes has not scheduled another mediation session, and there hasn’t been anything filed in the case by his court since the last session on April 11.

And, of course, there are no updates on carriage possibilities. I realize that’s the primary thing on everyone’s mind, and I generally neglect to address it because I don’t expect anything to happen on the carriage front until all the litigation is settled.

The next events on the docket involve Jim Crane’s lawsuit against Comcast and Drayton McLane. We’ll be back in court bright and early at 9 a.m. Monday as U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Marvin Isgur hears arguments on whether he has subject matter jurisdiction to hear the case, which was filed in state court but moved by Comcast to federal court. The Astros object to that move and want the case back in state court.

If Isgur rules he does have subject matter jurisdiction in the case, lawyers will return May 12 for arguments on the balance of the Astros’ motion to remand the case back to state court.

The network itself, meanwhile, continues operating under Chapter 11 protection. We’re still a couple of months away, however, from the end of the 120-day exclusivity period that the network has to file a plan of reorganization. The judge could amend that period if he wishes, of course, but at the moment there doesn’t seem to me to be any indication that a resolution has been reached on the network’s governance and its future existence, if any.

Crane continues to make optimistic statements, most recently saying in Seattle that he thinks a resolution could come within a month. That’s a little hard to envision, given the pending appeals and so much time remaining on the clock for the debtor to file a reorganization plan, but who knows? There’s nothing wrong with optimism.

So many unanswered questions remain. The Rockets, for example, have said the only feasible future for CSN Houston is for Comcast to buy the network out of bankruptcy, and Comcast said a few weeks ago it would not do that. Of course, those objections could go out the window if, for example, Crane were to drop his lawsuit against McLane and Comcast.

Then again, perhaps Comcast’s change of mind has something to do with the pending Comcast-Time Warner Cable merger.

You may recall my doomsday scenario that Comcast is fine with getting out of CSN Houston under any circumstances because it plans to sell the Houston cable system as part of its agreement to drop 3.1 million subscribers in conjunction with the TWC merger. I seriously can’t see Comcast dumping the 10th largest TV market in the country, but I also can see the Justice Department raising red flags at a scenario under which the new Comcast would control every major market in Texas (save Fort Worth) by acquiring Time Warner.

Maybe there’s another Time Warner merger-related reason for not wanting to buy the network. I have no idea.

One fact on which we have not touched, because events keep getting in the way, is that Comcast quietly last fall took a $236 million writedown on its investment and its loans associated with

CSN Houston. The company, you will recall, spent $157 million to buy a 22 percent share of CSN Houston and granted a $100 million secured loan for startup and operating expenses. The writeoff, however, means that Comcast is now off the hook for its investment in the network and still has a pending claim at the top of the heap in bankruptcy court to get back its $100 million loan.

So that’s another matter to consider while trying to divine Comcast’s plans, which remains a difficult task, given that the company has been so tight-lipped on every aspect of CSN Houston since its launch in the fall of 2012.

I also see speculation elsewhere that if CSN Houston fails, the Rockets and Astros can just go back to Fox Sports Southwest and everyone lives happily ever after.

I have no doubt that FSSW could fit the Rockets back into its portfolio, given NBA territorial restrictions that prevent it from showing the Spurs or Mavericks in this area. But Fox has committed to pay the Rangers a lot of money – about $150 million a year on average through 2034, according to Sports Business Journal — and part of the reason is that it can now show Rangers games over the entire five-state region, including Houston and South Texas, which it could not do when it showed both Astros and Rangers games. Why would Fox agree to pay the Astros tens of millions of dollars to take back their games and at the same time reduce coverage for their Rangers games?

Bottom line: Even though we continue to do it, speculation is futile. People ask me all the time, “What does your gut say will happen?” At this point, my gut says there’s a hearing Monday. That’s as far as I’m going.

UPDATE: Several outlets are reporting that Comcast and Charter indeed are in talks about spinning off subscribers, but the manner in which the deal is describes makes it seem less likely to me that Houston could be involved. So never mind … maybe.